Decision ahead on controversial housing

COUNCILLORS will make decisions on several controversial schemes tonight including an 85-home estate in Wantage which has aroused protests.

Vale of White Horse District Council planning committee will decide whether to approve the details for the estate which the town council voted against.

Councillors and residents are worried that the estate, which would lead traffic onto Chain Hill, would produce congestion problems and overshadow neighbouring homes in Orchard Way. The Vale planning committee granted it outline permission in March last year.

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Tonight, at Wantage Civic Hall, the planning committee will discuss issues such as the type of housing and details of materials.

Meanwhile, the committee will also make a decision on an application by Costa Coffee in Wantage Market Place to have four tables with chairs on the pavement outside, which Wantage Town Council said would block the thoroughfare.

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Instead of building yet more housing in Oxfordshire and the South, and consistently over-burdening the exisiting infrastructure and services (including local police, ambulance, fire, schools and health service provision) why doesn't the Government 'encourage' such expansion and investment imto those parts of the UK which actually need more jobs, better housing and more investment - such as Cornwall, the North Midlands, North East and North West? Making places like Oxfordshire 'honeypots' not only over-burdens existing communities, but artificially increases land values, house prices, insurance (especially where homes have been allowed to be built on farmland and areas associated with the floodplains by corrupt and inadequate local planning authorities) but also puts massive pressure on doctor's surgeries, the ever-shrinking number of local hospitals, our schools, and all other public services - at a time when public service cut-backs have been adding even greater pressure during the 13 years of Labour's bad management, and worsened under the Tory-led Coalition. Nor does more housing really translate into more income for local authorities, most of whom are either incapable of asset management, or unable to maintain their existing housing stocks.

Instead of building yet more housing in Oxfordshire and the South, and consistently over-burdening the exisiting infrastructure and services (including local police, ambulance, fire, schools and health service provision) why doesn't the Government 'encourage' such expansion and investment imto those parts of the UK which actually need more jobs, better housing and more investment - such as Cornwall, the North Midlands, North East and North West? Making places like Oxfordshire 'honeypots' not only over-burdens existing communities, but artificially increases land values, house prices, insurance (especially where homes have been allowed to be built on farmland and areas associated with the floodplains by corrupt and inadequate local planning authorities) but also puts massive pressure on doctor's surgeries, the ever-shrinking number of local hospitals, our schools, and all other public services - at a time when public service cut-backs have been adding even greater pressure during the 13 years of Labour's bad management, and worsened under the Tory-led Coalition. Nor does more housing really translate into more income for local authorities, most of whom are either incapable of asset management, or unable to maintain their existing housing stocks.Myron Blatz

Instead of building yet more housing in Oxfordshire and the South, and consistently over-burdening the exisiting infrastructure and services (including local police, ambulance, fire, schools and health service provision) why doesn't the Government 'encourage' such expansion and investment imto those parts of the UK which actually need more jobs, better housing and more investment - such as Cornwall, the North Midlands, North East and North West? Making places like Oxfordshire 'honeypots' not only over-burdens existing communities, but artificially increases land values, house prices, insurance (especially where homes have been allowed to be built on farmland and areas associated with the floodplains by corrupt and inadequate local planning authorities) but also puts massive pressure on doctor's surgeries, the ever-shrinking number of local hospitals, our schools, and all other public services - at a time when public service cut-backs have been adding even greater pressure during the 13 years of Labour's bad management, and worsened under the Tory-led Coalition. Nor does more housing really translate into more income for local authorities, most of whom are either incapable of asset management, or unable to maintain their existing housing stocks.

Score: 2

brucklay227 says...10:13am Thu 6 Mar 14

It seems sense to put all the required housing quota in one place rather than collapsing existing community life in extending Didcot, Abingdon, Wantage, Oxford and so many Vale villages. A Garden City, as has recently been discussed in this newspaper, that could be really beautifully and thoughtfully planned to include all our vast housing quota together with social amenities, surgeries, schools, hospital, light industrial, retail, town centre and with rail and road links solves all such problems for the future all in one fell swoop. Such would be an opportunity to gear up for the future in an aesthetically pleasing way. We are at the science epicentre of the nation and this places our area as one of extreme importance. Vision is needed, but do we have it?

It seems sense to put all the required housing quota in one place rather than collapsing existing community life in extending Didcot, Abingdon, Wantage, Oxford and so many Vale villages.
A Garden City, as has recently been discussed in this newspaper, that could be really beautifully and thoughtfully planned to include all our vast housing quota together with social amenities, surgeries, schools, hospital, light industrial, retail, town centre and with rail and road links solves all such problems for the future all in one fell swoop. Such would be an opportunity to gear up for the future in an aesthetically pleasing way. We are at the science epicentre of the nation and this places our area as one of extreme importance.
Vision is needed, but do we have it?brucklay227

It seems sense to put all the required housing quota in one place rather than collapsing existing community life in extending Didcot, Abingdon, Wantage, Oxford and so many Vale villages. A Garden City, as has recently been discussed in this newspaper, that could be really beautifully and thoughtfully planned to include all our vast housing quota together with social amenities, surgeries, schools, hospital, light industrial, retail, town centre and with rail and road links solves all such problems for the future all in one fell swoop. Such would be an opportunity to gear up for the future in an aesthetically pleasing way. We are at the science epicentre of the nation and this places our area as one of extreme importance. Vision is needed, but do we have it?

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